Joint call was launched during 3rd November Conference

Last 23-24 November, more than 150 participants attended the 3rd November Conference, an annual event on collaboration between Norway and Brazil within research, development and innovation (RD&I) in the oil and gas industry.

The ambition of the conference is to stimulate and intensify existing cooperation and find new areas for shared value creation. The project was initiated by the SINOS alliance (SINTEF, NTNU, UIO, IFE, Simula and IRIS), which has a cooperation agreement on the oil and gas and maritime sector with six of the most important universities in Brazil – ReNoBra.

In the first edition of the conference, the memorandum of understanding known as BN21 was signed between the Norwegian Ministry of Petroleum and Energy (OED) and the Brazilian Ministry of Research, Technology and Innovation (MCTI). This bilateral agreement serves as a framework for Brazil-Norway cooperation in the oil and gas sector in the current century.

In 2014, Innovation Norway took over the responsibility of organizing the November Conference. As the main responsible for the event, IN coordinates the financing of the event, the dialog between SINOS alliance and all parties involved, the elaboration of the program, the overall preparation of the event and the development of the conference as such.

Announcement of first joint call

During the opening of this year’s conference, Finep and the Research Council of Norway launched the first joint call for projects. The two countries aim to make funding available for joint projects in especially through partnerships. The joint call will take place no later than in the beginning of 2016.

Consul General Sissel Hodne Steen highlighted the importance of the bilateral agreements celebrated between Norwegian and Brazilian institutions, and added the importance of taking actions in order to move forward with the work.

Finep will support the Brazilian companies with a total amount of BRL 5 million (current rate – NOK 11.5 million), while the Research Council of Norway will support the Norwegian ones with NOK 10 million. The financing will follow the established concession rules by financing institutions.

According to Elias Ramos (Finep), Norway plays a key role in the Brazilian oil and gas sector, and without the knowhow and investments of foreigners in this industry, Brazilian oil would have stayed below ground. Finep expects the exchange of experiences between Norwegian and Brazilian companies will allow Brazil to build a more innovative, diversified and competitive oil industry.

Siri Helle Friedemann, director of the oil and gas division of the Research Council of Norway, said the joint call will focus on companies addressing the oil industry challenges that the two countries have to deal with. Furthermore, the Research Council of Norway is also working on a joint call together with CNPq, responsible for financing projects in early stage.

The resources are offered to the development of technologies meeting the demands of the oil and gas industry within the scope of submarine technology, advanced oil recovery and environmental technology.

Industry challenges for the upcoming years

Several key players from Norwegian and Brazilian R&D institutions were invited to speak at this year’s conference.

The panel discussion also brought up the dialogue about the reduced availability for RD&I funds in the market and the presence of foreign institutions in the Brazilian research sector. Several other speakers highlighted the importance of cooperation in the development of new technologies, especially during the current crisis scenario.

The universities showed figures about collaboration projects involving Brazilian and Norwegian parties as well as numbers of exchange students and professors that have attended programs in partner institutions. The University of Oslo, for example, received 18 Brazilian PhD candidates in 2013 and 2014, 63 Master’s degree students between 2012 and 2015, and 95 inbound exchange students from Brazil between 2011 and 2015.

The industrial session on the first day of the conference consisted in presentations by Statoil, Petrobras, PGS and Concremat.

The second day, the conference was divided into five parallel, technical sessions. In the morning, it took place the sessions on a) Flow assurance/Multi-phase flow and b) Exploration – basin analysis and restoration. In the afternoon, the program was followed by the parallel sessions on c) Environmental challenges in deep waters, d) Integrated Operations, and e) IOR/EOR.

A plenary session was held at the end of the program in order to summarize the conference and outline the way forward in the upcoming year.

The chairman of the conference Kjetil Solbrække added that an increased and more systematic contact between researchers in our two countries has been one of the main achievements of the November Conference.